Death and Nightmares Are Always Never Fair
by PheonixFireBlack
Summary: One of our good Atlantis team members is being plagued with horrible dreams. What of? Why? And is it messing him up so much that he can't do his job? Someone needs to figure out what's going on with this guy.


Title - Death and Nightmares Are Always Never Fair  
By - PheonixFireBlack  
Summary - One of our good Atlantis team members is being plagued with horrible dreams. What of? Why? And is it messing him up so much that he can't do his job? Someone needs to figure out what's going on with this guy.  
Category - Stargate: Atlantis  
Genre - Angst/General  
Feedback - Please? My first Atlantis fic! I'd love to know what you think of it  
Criticism - Sure! I don't mind! grins Makes me a better writer. However, if you must, flame me, feel free to do so. I need a good laugh.  
_**Disclaimer - I do NOT own anything from Stargate: Atlantis. Obviously, right? I mean, I could not come up with the Wraith. I can't even write my own Sci-fi stuff, what makes you think I could come up with something that good. Yeah...right. rolls eyes lol!  
**_Notes - Well, I really love the show and I decided that since I like it so much that I'd make a lil one-shot for you guys to enjoy. So...here you go! (Oh, and guys, please correct any routine doctor check up mistakes I make. I have only been to the doctor once in the last like...6 or 7 years. I don't have routine checks. I don't remember what the doctors do. Then again, I'm willing to be they might be a bit different around there, as I've currently dubbed it until further notice, Atlantis Command since, well, come on, the people are going to weird planets. Ahh, anyway...yeah, I shall stand corrected if need be grin) Enjoy!

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Death And Nightmares Are Always Never Fair  
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A toss. A turn. A mumble. A jerk. And suddenly he was sitting straight up in his bed, fully awake. He ran a hand through his hair and sighed shakily. He could feel the tears stinging his eyes. He didn't want to let them spill, but he knew that they would. After a few minutes of complete silence, he started muttering to himself. "That dream...it never goes away, does it? Why can't I just store it in the back of my mind? Don't want to forget completely...No. I couldn't do that. But I don't want that particular memory to be in the front of my mind all the time."

The specific memory he was muttering to himself about was one that he hadn't relived in quite some time, which he had to admit, he was glad of. One reason he liked that he hadn't revisited that moment in his life, was the fact that it really screwed him up; mentally and emotionally. Usually after such a recurrence of sorts, he would find himself attached to certain people. People he worked with, people he didn't want to loose. He would hardly let some of them out of his sight. And it was never a good idea to get so attached to some of the people he dealt within his line of work. Definitely not good.

Dr. Carson Beckett never liked going back to that moment. Though, he found himself going back to that specific moment in time every year, sometimes more than once a year. Every time he went back to it, he fought with himself over it. He hadn't done it because he wanted to. He'd done it because he had to, as a doctor. Carson would berate himself over it, sometimes for three or four hours at a time. One side of him felt as if he had done it because he wished it to happen; that was the extremely unreasonable half of him. The other half, the more realistic half, told him that it wasn't that; that it was simply because it had been his job at the time. Carson never really knew which half of his brain he should believe. He **_wanted_** to believe the reasonable part of himself, but he never could be completely certain which way to turn.

Carson took a few moments to calm himself. When that was all said and done, considering that it was half past three in the morning, he decided that he should probably go to sleep. If today was going to be anything like two days ago in the hospital wing, he would need to run on as much sleep as he could possibly get. The infirmary had been very crowded and active the day before yesterday. It had been quite hectic, to be completely honest. And so, Carson decided to at least try to go back to sleep before being forced to get up again.

The next day, Carson was so unfocused that it was nowhere near funny. Nor was it to be going on without anyone noticing. At the beginning of the morning, everything was fine and normal as any other day could be. No one would have guessed that something was wrong with him at all first thing in the morning. However, it wasn't very long and people could start noticing things. Though, Beckett knew no one was noticing; not yet, at least.

There was one thing that Carson did that made everything obvious, but that didn't come until Major Sheppard came in for a routine check. It was something that Beckett shouldn't have done. He really, really shouldn't have opened his mouth...at all. "Here for a routine check up, are you, Sheppard?" The doctor asked when the dark-haired Major came into the infirmary.

"Yep." Sheppard sighed, hopping up onto the examination table. "God...I need sleep. But, no. I can't get that. I'm not allowed to sleep. I am prohibited from sleeping." He sighed again and leaned back on his arms, watching Dr. Beckett fool with needles and other things. John raised an eyebrow at the doctors back, "You ok, Beckett?"

"Fine...I'm fine. Why wouldn't I be ok? Do I...seem as if I'm not fine?" He rambled quickly in his heavy Scottish accent.

John opened his mouth to speak, then closed it, frowning in confusion, only to open it again when he knew what he was going to say. "Well...no...you seem...ok, I guess. Uh...just...asking." Then again, maybe he really wasn't so sure about what he was going to say. "But now that you mention it...you have seemed a little off today."

"Off? How so?" Carson started fiddling with the needles and things again, a little quicker, moving things around a little faster than before.

"Uh...I dunno. Maybe you weren't off, maybe I just don't know you well enough." He shrugged, then decided to change the topic. "Eh...ya gonna just...keep fooling around with that stuff or you gonna check me out?"

"Anxious, are we, Major?" Carson decided to try and flip the tables around to get the spotlight off himself for a bit.

John took the hint, and answered his question, "Yeah, I'll admit, a little."

"Why's that, exactly?"

"I...don't really like needles."

"Oh, really?" Beckett asked, walking over to his patient.

"Yeah. It was a...uh, let's just say...bad experience."

"Bad experience? I get that a lot." He said, doing one thing or another with the needle in his hand. John didn't particularly pay attention, as he didn't really care.

"Well...what can I say? That woman didn't know how to give a shot! All she had to do was take a bit of blood. Could she do it? Yeah, she did it, alright. Could she do it right, necessarily? Not so much."

"Really? That bad, eh?"

"Yes. She kept going in at the exact same place. She went in that same place, I swear to God, six times before she got it right. Needless to say, my wrist hurt like hell and I never went back there for fear of running into the same woman again."

"So, what do you have planned for the day?" Beckett asked, motioning to tell the Major they were done.

"Not much. Found a new 'Gate address. Weir wants us to go off for a little while, couple hours probably." Sheppard said nonchalantly.

Before he knew what he was saying, Carson turned to face the Major, "Do you have to go today?"

"I...would assume. I mean, Weir was telling us all about it about an hour ago. Said we should all have our checks and then we could go." A slight frown suddenly graced the Major's face, along with his head tilting slightly. "Why?" He asked curiously. It wasn't like the Doc to act like this.

"I...don't know. I just...I-I don't what I was...I was just..." He stammered out, "We-We're done, just send in the next person. The sooner the checks are over with, the quicker you get out of here, right?" Carson quickly turned back to whatever he had been fooling with earlier.

"You ok, man?"

"Fine...I'm fine. Don't worry about me." He said quickly.

"Alright, if you say so. You are the doctor." John's eyebrows shot up and fell moments later. He wasn't sure what it was, but the Major wasn't exactly what you would call stupid. Sure, he didn't know the Doc that well, but he knew him well enough that he had never acted like this. John knew him well enough to know that something was wrong.

John wasn't about to let himself be the only one that knew something was wrong with the resident doctor of the Atlantis Command. He had to let someone know. Someone that the doctor talked to a lot. But who was that? Hmm....John had to think about that one. There was always Weir, but he figured that woman had enough on her plate to deal with. There had to be someone else. Carson couldn't only talk to Weir. Who else would he have any interest in talking to, though?

As he was walking toward his quarters to get the needed weapons and things for the new mission, John's shoulder brushed someone else's. He muttered a slight apology, before he realized who it was. It was Rodney McKay. And the bells rang, angels sang, lightning struck and tons of other cliches. However, it all came down to the fact that realization passed over Sheppard. "McKay, wait..."

McKay turned around to face the Major, his name being called. "What? I didn't touch anything."

"Do go stealing my line now, that's just not right." John grinned, however, he quickly turned somber and became a lot more serious. "Actually, there's something I need to tell you."

"About..." McKay's eyes widened, "It's not something about the power around here is it?"

"No...actually, it's about the doctor around here." John said quietly.

"What? Beckett?"

"Yeah..."

"What do you mean, what's going on?" Though he was slightly sarcastic and he tended to argue with the doctor on a near-normal-basis, Rodney really couldn't help but let his interest--and concern--in what the Major had said show through.

"I'm not sure. I was kind of thinkin' that you might be able to find out. I mean, you talk all the time so..." He shrugged, "I mean...I tried to find something out without seeming like I was trying to pry or something, but...you two talk all the time, he probably wouldn't think much of it, you know?" Sheppard shrugged again, "It doesn't matter, I don't guess. But he was acting kind of weird a few minutes ago..."

"Weird?" That was quite the vague statement.

"I don't know. He was just kind I've never seen him organize stuff when he was supposed to be doing routine checks."

"He doesn't. He doesn't do anything except whatever it is he has to do for the check."

"Exactly. Anyway, see if you can find anything, but don't tell Weir. She's got enough on her shoulders."

"Right."

"Look, I gotta go to some other planet for a couple of hours. See ya later." And the two were just about to go off in their separate ways, but something slapped John in the memory. "McKay, wait."

"What?" McKay asked, slightly annoyed.

"I mentioned that I was going off today when Beckett was doing my check, you know, just kind of for some kind of conversation. Anyway, he almost immediately, in this really...damn near desperate tone, asked if I really had to go today. It was really weird." John nodded his exit and left to his quarters--for real, this time.

Carson was done with his job for the moment, until someone else came waltzing into the infirmary. He was kind of hoping that no one would come in soon; he wanted to be alone for a bit. He had a doubt against it, of course, but he prayed for it anyway. Carson ran a hand through his hair. He couldn't believe that he had actually said what he had to Sheppard. And it wasn't just what he had said, but how he had said it. He had sounded so...soliciting.

Beckett knew that he shouldn't be so shocked with his actions. It was that day; and that dream. They had him thrown for a real loop. He had known this was going to happen since half past three this morning, but he didn't think anyone would find anything out. He thought he could keep it all to himself. The dream must have done more of a number on him than he thought.

Since he was thinking about the early morning and the dream, Beckett started to slip back into the memory of the day that it had happened. However, he realized this before it was too late, and shook himself from it. He didn't need to think about that right now. It wasn't a good idea to think about that kind of thing as long as he was on duty here. He had people to deal with; people that might need serious medical attention, and he could be letting his mind wander around like that.

Carson jumped slightly when he heard the door open. When he heard the familiar voice from the door come, he relaxed.

"Busy, Beckett?"

"No, McKay, not right now."

"Alright then," McKay muttered, entering the infirmary and walking over to sit on the desk that Carson was sitting at.

"Come to let me know all about some new thing or other you found?" Carson asked, only assuming that's what it was since that was usually the reason Rodney broke away from the science lab and came to the infirmary in the middle of the day.

"I'm hurt that you would dare assume anything like that." McKay really did have wit and sarcasm down like an art. "No, actually, I was just wondering what was going on. I haven't found any 'new thing or other' to show you."

"Oh...Well, nothing much has been going on. I did a couple of routine checks earlier, but...other than that, nothing."

"That's...not really what I meant." Rodney said slowly.

A frown was gracing Carson's face as he looked up at the astrophysicist, "Well, then what did you mean?"

McKay considered things for a moment, sighed, and went right into it. "Look, Sheppard told me that when you were giving him his check, you were acting...kind of strange..." He trailed off, hoping that the doctor would take the hint to explain.

"Strange? He hardly knows me. How would he know when I was acting strange?"

"He...also told me that when he mentioned that he was going off today...you kind of...I don't know, he said you asked if he had to go today specifically, or something like that. He said you sounded...desperate." McKay shrugged slightly.

Now Beckett was the quietest he had been in all the short amount of time that Rodney had known the man. It was clear that he didn't want to talk about whatever it was that was going on. However, if it was going to be affecting his work, he really probably should say something about it.

Carson sighed and looked down his hands on the desk. The topic that Rodney was starting to making him get on was a touchy one and really not something he discussed with just anyone.

"Look, if you don't want to talk, I can go. I can just...go find something to fool around with." McKay shrugged and slid off the desk, walking by the doctor to leave.

"There is..." Carson hesitated, "Something..."

Rodney looked over his should at the Scottish man. He spoke; that was definitely a good sign, right? Rodney took a couple of backwards steps and hopped back up on the desk again. "What is it?"

And suddenly, Beckett became anxious to not talk about it again."I-It's not exactly something I...prefer talking about. I don't just go around and tell people this sort of thing all the time." Carson tried to shake the flashes coming to his mind off, but he knew it would never work; it never did, and he was going to talk about it, too and that wouldn't exactly help the images go away any quicker. "But...I guess I'm going to have to at least trust the people I'm going to be working with, right?"

"I would guess that might make things a bit...easier."

"Alright...." Beckett started, already hesitating. With a sigh, he went into the explanation. "Six years ago, I was...I was married to the most wonderful woman--her name was Caitlin. She was...beautiful. Her eyes...I loved her eyes. They were so...blue...it hardly seemed as if there was a blue that specific shade. And when she smiled or laughed...it was...it was just...I don't know..." Carson shook his head. Like anyone would want to hear him go on about all the things he loved about Caitlin. "Sorry, I just...I should get to the point." He stopped, knowing what he was going to have to say, and knowing that every bit of him was against saying it.

McKay couldn't help but notice how the doctor kept talking about the woman in the past tense. He could sense something with a not-so-happy ending coming. "It's ok...describe her all you want." Rodney said quietly. He didn't think Beckett wanted him to know the full story, the way he had his head tilted down, but he could see the tears brimming. Whatever it was that happened, it wasn't good at all.

"It was...It was near Christmas and she was going to go and...see her sister. She just moved into town and...so, she was going to go see her. N-no problem, right? We were wrong. She went alone...I should've gone with her...but she went alone. There were...ice and snow everywhere, it was really bad on the roads, but you couldn't drive in. We didn't think anything about it. We'd both grown up there, we knew how the winters were. Anyway, she...she was driving to her sister's and there was a loading truck coming around a corner too fast and...he hit a patch of black ice and..." Beckett stopped. He couldn't. No...he just couldn't say anything more. There was no use in trying; he knew he couldn't.

"I can...fill in the blanks there." Rodney said, really starting to feel Carson's depression.

"Went right to her. All the impact and everything. Got a call from...one of our friends that found her. Took her to the hospital immediately. They said they wouldn't let me be the doctor to her. I insisted. I didn't want anyone else working with her. They kept saying that I couldn't; that I was too emotionally attached or some other nonsense. I wouldn't have it any other way, and...they finally let me. She ended up being in fairly good shape, far as...broken bones and things like that went. The worst of it, though, she...she was in a coma and the chance of her coming to from it...it was slim to none, but I didn't care. There was a chance, I thought, and that was good, right? Well that was wrong. There was still a chance, but her parents...they wouldn't let me keep her there anymore." Beckett could feel the tears leaking from his eyes, leaving in buckets.

"They said they didn't want to...I don't know, make her suffer or...put her through the misery of staying there when they knew she wasn't going to wake up. I tried to talk them out of it, but I couldn't. They had their minds set and there was no changing them." Carson took in a shaky breath as he got ready for the worst of it all.

"I...I did get them on for a week. They...they agreed to a week, but after that, I couldn't get anything from them. They said they didn't care what I thought, that they knew she was going through tons and tons of misery and they wanted her to be pulled off of everything that was related to any kind of life support. I was supposed to do it, but I couldn't. No way. There was no way in hell that I was going to pull the plug on my wife. I couldn't do it, so they had another doctor come in, someone that didn't know her at all, and he did it. And he did it so quickly. If he'd known her, he wouldn't have been able to do it. She was such a wonderful woman...such a beautiful person. She had a great personality and everything. But that didn't matter. And it didn't matter that I thought they should keep her there for at least another couple of months. They killed her anyway." He closed his eyes and let the tears fall. "I had to watch some guy pull the plug on my wife and kill her. I had to watch her die...Her parents weren't even there. Guess it was too much for them. Well, I don't think they know what I've been through for the past five years...they don't know how it is to relive that moment every year. I do...I was there. I watched her die."

Rodney wasn't sure what to say. Maybe there wasn't anything to say. He knew one thing for sure; that was absolutely the worst thing he could think of that he had ever heard in his life. No wonder Beckett was acting off today; that was definitely a plausible reason. "God...I can't even imagine that. I am...so sorry. There are...no words whatsoever for how sorry I am. I really don't know what else to say, but...God...I really can't imagine living with that image in my head for so long. I...I'm really sorry." Was all he could say. He knew it was repetitive, but that was all Rodney could think of to say. What else would anyone say to that?"

After taking a few moments to sober himself and calm himself down, Carson looked up at Rodney. His eyes were holding quite possibly the most pleading look on the face of the earth as he spoke. "You...you aren't going to tell anyone, are you? I-I don't...I really don't want everyone knowing about this."

"No, no, no...if you...if you don't want me to tell anyone, trust me. I won't breathe a word. If anyone else finds out, it will be because you told them." McKay confirmed that one. If Beckett wanted him to keep his mouth shut, he damn well would. There was no way he would just go around telling people about it, anyway, but since Carson had specifically asked him not to, Rodney was in no shape, fashion, or form going to tell a soul about this.

"Thanks..." Carson muttered. "God, someone else is going to have to come in. But how am I going to get out of this?"

"You're sick?" Rodney suggested, only to receive a half-glare-look from Beckett. "Right. How about..." He moved his hands around a bit, "Ahh...I've got nothing."

"Great lot of help you are." Carson muttered. "I'll think of something."

"You gonna be alright?"

"Yeah....I...I'll be fine. I-I go through this every year...but I've never actually told anyone about it until today. Never talked about it to anyone that didn't already know..." Beckett smiled a little at the astrophysicist. "Thanks for listening."

"Anytime...as long as I'm not trying to process the information from one piece of alien technology to the other." He grinned, "Or if I'm dying at the moment. That might not be a good time to start talking to me, unless it's to keep me conscious."

Carson nodded, "Ahh, I see you're coming from. Makes sense, really, it does."

"I'll see you later, ok?"

"Alright, then." As Rodney slowly made his way to leave the hospital wing, Carson watched. He had to admit, of all the people here at the Atlantis Command, he really didn't think that Rodney McKay of all people would have been the one that he told all that to. Dr. Weir was the first person that came to mind, but she really had enough to deal with, so she wasn't much of an option anyway. Beckett was glad that he had someone he could talk to about things like that here. He didn't really have anyone back home to confide things in, so it was kind of new to him. However, the doctor thought he could get very used to being able to talk to someone. He thought he could get exceptionally used to it.

Notes - Oh, God, tell me you guys liked that. I loved it. It was so much fun to write. But, really, when I was having Beckett talk about Caitlin, I had tears in my eyes. Even way at the beginning because, you know, I knew where I was leading and all. I am really surprised I'm not just absolutely crying right now. I will admit, though, I'm quite on the verge of it. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed that bit.

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End Death And Nightmares Are Always Never Fair  
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Give me a buzz and let me know what you thought!

Later days,  
-PFB-


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